Just before the koronaepidemien broke out in earnest in Europe, visited the Norwegian broadcasting corporation, the Royal Marsden Hospital in London where five patients are participating in a pilot program.
the Hospital treats only cancer patients, and it is here that the technique be tested on sick people for the very first time.
Method, which is utivklet in Norway, that one combines the micro bubbles in the blood with the ultrasound. The goal is to give the patient a greater effect of cellegiften.
fingers crossed
One of the five patients who have agreed to participate in the study, is Paul Smith. 56-year-old living just outside London. He got colorectal cancer in July 2017.
I have incurable liver cancer, that is why I am with that subject, ” says Smith.
Photo: Paal Wergeland / NRK
– I am diagnosed with colorectal cancer with incurable spread to the liver. I have operated tarmkreften, it is removed, but unfortunately is leverkreften impossible to cure. Now I get palliative treatment, thus stabilizing and analgesia or pain killers treatment. That is why I am on the attempt.
Marks you the treatment?
– No, when you first plugged into, I know nothing. You can get some chemical taste in the mouth at first, but it is quite painless.
At the hospital, he receives chemotherapy combined with mikroboblene. Today is his fourth and final round of the new medicine. After a few weeks he will take a MRI to check if it has the effect on the cancer or not.
– It would be nice if it shrink the tumor my, or whether it is stable. Then we’ll see what it ends with. I cross my fingers, ” says Smith.
the First patients to be tested now
Right now takes place the first clinical testing of the new technique on patients at the Royal Marsden Hospital in London.
– This is a very exciting project. We are trying to increase the efficacy of chemotherapy in patients ‘ tumors. We are trying to survey the security and the impact on patients. In the first instance, we test the treatment on five patients, ” says Udal Banerji, head of department at the Institute of Cancer Research.
The first patients that we test on have liver cancer, ” says head of department at the Institute of Cancer Research.
Photo: Ketil Kern / NRK
– what makes It so exciting is that if you succeed with this method, one will in the future be able to provide high-dose-chemotherapy directly into the tumors, without major side effects in the entire body, ” he says.
Boosts the effect of chemotherapy
It is the Norwegian company Phoenix Solutions has developed the technique. The background is that the current use of chemotherapy is ineffective.
When traditional treatment spreads cellegiften themselves to the whole body. Thus healthy cells are destroyed, and many are struggling with major side effects during and after treatment.
What is the major advantage with the technique?
We envision that it may come on the market in 2024, ” says Per Christian Sontum, managing director at Phoenix Solutions.
Photo: Inger Lee / NRK
– It is that we can use a drug that we know works against a given sykdomsbilde, and increase the effect of the medicinal product with a method like this. If we are able to achieve roughly the same power levels as we have seen in preclinical animal studies, it is clear that this can be an important new treatment of a number of types of cancer, mean Per Christian Sontum, managing director at Phoenix Solutions.
For the moment, there are patients with levermetastaser from colon cancer technique to be tested on for the first time. Thus, it is patients with kreftspredning to live from a primærsvulst in other organs.
In the long term is the hope that the treatment can be used on other cancers.
–Yes, absolutely. We have very good data on bukspyttkjertelkreft, liver, breast and prostate, ” says Sontum.
the Goal of the new medical method is that cellegiften to hit the cancer tumor more precisely.
So it seems
– When the chemotherapy is injected, the artery wall is one of the biggest barriers that the medicine is working. It is so tight that the medicine does not come out and hit the cancer cells, explains Sontum.
With the new method, the syringes also micro bubbles into the bloodstream. When these bubbles are approaching the cancer tumor used ultrasound to form a large bubble.
Picture of how it looks out into the blood vessels when medicine and ultrasound work together with chemotherapy.
Photo: Ketil Kern / NRK
– When you then apply additional ultrasound, pulls and drag it on the cells in the artery wall. So it opens up small pores and it makes cellegiften hit the cancer cells in the tumor on the outside of the where we use the ultralyden, says Sontum.
-Tiny bubbles is sprayed into the blood vessels explains Sontum.
Photo: NRK Norway in the world
the Doctor and the professor, Odd Helge Gilja, working as a leader in the National kompetansetjeneste for gastroenterologisk ultrasound. At the Haukeland university hospital in Bergen, they have already conducted a study with the use of ultrasound in the treatment of cancer. Gilja says that Norway is situated far forward.
We start clinical tests of the new modality in may, says the head of the National kompetansetjeneste for gastroenterologisk ultrasound Odd Helge Gilja.
Photo: NRK
Norway is located totally in the world. Here at Haukeland, we made the world’s first treatment, we combined ultrasound micro bubbles and chemotherapy against pancreatic cancer. This study was a door opener to other environments in the world and has also been a door opener for this Norwegian company has a new and similar concept, ” says Gilja.
He tells that they should go ahead with clinical tests also in Norway.
We proceed now to test the ACT-principle to the Phoenix solution in Norway. Bergen and Oslo are the first places to attempt this.
After the plan was patient-testing in Norway have started up with patients that have spread from the colon to the liver in may. But because of the koronaepedemien, all clinical studies put on hold.
Rutinebehandling, it is a good piece of forward to. The need for extensive studies with kontrollpersoner to determine how effective the new technique is.
– It is too early to say how much we are going to use this method, but preliminary data are very promising, ” concludes Gilja.
